"Good, Mr. Metcalf," said Lady Derby. "I have not laughed since my lord rode out, until to-day. Where is this Michael who rode to York?"
"With the rest of the good Metcalfs," said Rupert. "I left the whole fine brood to guard Lathom from without. They go north with me in two days' time. You shall see them—six-score on their white horses." A shadow crossed his face; the so-called failing of the Stuart temperament was his, and he counted each man lost as a brother to be mourned for.
"Why the cloud on your face, Prince?" asked Lady Derby.
"There are only five-score now. When we counted our dead at Bolton, there were some gallant Metcalfs lying face upward to their God."
A sickness came to Christopher. He turned aside, and longed for the mother who had sheltered his young days. Bloodshed and wounds he had foreseen; but to his boy's view of life, it seemed incredible that any of the jolly Yoredale clan should die—should go out for ever, beyond reach of hand-grip.
"Was my father with the slain—or Michael?" he asked by and by.
"Neither, lad." Rupert came and touched him on the arm. "Oh, I know, I know! The pity of one's dead—and yet their glory—it is all a muddle, this affair of war."
It was on the second morning afterwards, while Rupert was getting his army in readiness for the march on York, that Lady Derby saw Christopher standing apart, the new sadness in his face.
"You are thinking of your dead?" she said, in her brisk, imperative way. "Laddie, do you not guess that the dead are thinking, too, of you?"
"They rest where they lie," he said, stubborn in his grief.